


Never say no to...

by moth2fic



Category: The Professionals
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-27
Updated: 2010-12-27
Packaged: 2017-10-14 03:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/145054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moth2fic/pseuds/moth2fic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's Christmas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never say no to...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fictionwriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fictionwriter/gifts).



> Written as a gfit fic for Fictionwriter who asked for fluff and gave me a prompt which I turned into the title. Many thanks for a rapid and meticulous beta by Slantedlight,

It was Christmas Eve, and as usual they were on duty, up to the eyeballs in criminals, gangsters and mayhem.

“Wouldn’t you think,” Doyle mused aloud, “they’d all just decide to stay at home with their families? Switch the lights on on their trees and wrap parcels for their kids instead of raising all kinds of hell on the streets?”

Bodie laughed. “Their families are probably glad they’re out of the house. They like the money but not the reality that goes with it. I mean, if you were married to Hawthorne, would you want him home, even for Christmas?”

Doyle did a quick double-take at the idea of being married to Hawthorne but considered for a moment.

“I think his wife would be happier to have him safely indoors rather than risk a policeman on the doorstep with bad news to wreck the holiday.”

Hawthorne was their current target, a man who manipulated other criminals, leaving a trail of distrust and deceit in his wake. He had a finger in most pies: drug running, arms smuggling, freelance passing of classified information, prostitution and the hiring of hitmen. It was proving hard to catch him doing anything illegal or even immoral but Doyle and Bodie knew he was a king-pin in the London world of organised crime and that the streets would be safer if he was permanently removed from them, preferably to prison but possibly to an early grave. Wherever Hawthorne trod, others would fall or fight or seek revenge. And that led to a situation that Cowley thought should not be countenanced.

“I want him contained, lads,” he’d said. “In a coffin if necessary.”

They didn’t question Cowley’s judgement. They were his weapons, his strong right and left arms; they acted on his thoughts.

“Still,” said Doyle to Bodie, later, “I’d rather find something we could charge him with and arrest him.”

“That’s the bleeding-heart policeman speaking, not the CI5 operative.” Bodie got a hard look but no response to his comment.

And now they were sitting in a car watching a warehouse where Hawthorne was thought to be meeting someone, ostensibly to inspect a consignment of toys.

“If I was one of his kids,” said Bodie, “I’d be worried what might turn up in my stocking if Daddy came home. An explosive teddy bear or a doll with a spy camera.”

“Or a poisoned apple,” said Doyle, shifting slightly in the seat of the Capri, trying to get comfortable and failing. It was cold, and they were wearing heavy jackets but couldn’t risk running the engine to keep the heater working. Bodie knew Doyle’s muscles were cooling, losing their ready-to-leap tone. His own were, too. It couldn’t be helped. However much they stretched and did small aerobic exercises a stake-out would always reduce their efficiency slightly. He just hoped this time they wouldn’t need it.

“Thought that was the evil queen,” he said. “Hawthorne’s poison would come in a syringe in a kiddie’s nurse’s kit, not an apple.”

They continued with the desultory speculation, finding wilder and wilder things to ascribe to Hawthorne’s gift list. It was a way of passing the time and if their humour was a little forced that was due to the temperature and the date, not to their shared sense of the ridiculous.

“Why are they bringing in toys at this stage, anyway?” Doyle was disgruntled; criminals should have more respect for festivals. “Everybody’s done their Christmas shopping by now.”

“Dunno. Maybe they’re for the January sales. Cheap and flashy to let the customers think they’re getting a bargain when really they’re paying more than they would have done last summer.”

“Cynic.”

“Yeah.”

“I got this jacket in the sales last year.”

“I rest my case.” Bodie smiled smugly but glanced at Doyle’s jacket all the same. Ray looked good in it but then he looked good in anything, didn’t he? Wouldn’t do to let him know, though. Might go to his head, which was big enough already. Nice head, but... He put a firm brake on the runaway train that his thoughts were forming. Plenty of time to dream when he was safely at home, out of the way of criminals and out of the way of the object of his thoughts.

“Have a biccie.” Doyle produced a cylindrical packet from somewhere. The top had been opened and twisted shut. Heaven only knew where he’d secreted the things; his jeans were too tight to hide one biscuit, let alone a packet of them. They were chocolate digestives and Bodie’s mouth watered.

“You know I’ll never say no to a choccy biccie,” he said, taking the packet, untwisting the top, and taking three. “One of the three things I’ll never say no to.”

His comment, which might have continued to enumerate his other ‘things’ was interrupted by the opening of the warehouse door. A man came out at a run, clutching his shoulder and looking wildly around as if for help. There was a shot from the interior into the open street and then all hell broke loose. There were men everywhere, bullets ricocheting off concrete walls, shouts and grunts.

The partners were out of their car, guns drawn, cold muscles forgotten. Bodie frantically thumbed his RT, letting HQ know the score but following Doyle towards the battle. They couldn’t take on this many on their own but they could keep track of their man. Police and ambulances might arrive before back-up and it wouldn’t suit Cowley to lose Hawthorne into the system.

As he’d thought, sirens were blaring. And Doyle, stupid beautiful idiot, was in the thick of it, wrestling with a hulking figure and disarming him by sheer bloody determination, with, Bodie admitted, a bit of Macklin-induced technique thrown in. But for all his pains, Doyle ended up flung against a bollard, head struck just once, but that was all it took, by a rifle butt. Bodie wasn’t even sure the man who held it had meant to hit Doyle or if it had just been the side effect of a swing against someone else. Either way, it must have hurt and his partner was out of action.

By the time he’d extricated Doyle from the clutches of the police (who not unnaturally thought he was one of the villains), checked him into an ambulance and found out where it was taking him, discovered that Hawthorne, also injured, was heading the same way, and reported to the Cow, it was Christmas Day. And there was still the warehouse itself to check out, as well as reports to write. The jammy bugger was well out of it, in a nice hospital bed with nurses feeling festive, and nothing to do but rest.

Bodie, Murphy and Jax headed the warehouse team. Sure enough, they found guns. They were masquerading as toy guns; every tenth box was the real thing. The CI5 men cursed the toymakers who thought children’s guns should look more and more like their deadly counterparts each year. It was hard to sort out the fake from the real and by the time they’d finished a winter dawn was breaking. They headed back to HQ, satisfied that Hawthorne would have a hard time weaselling out of this. He must have known what was in the boxes, must have known there were armed men there, must surely have been involved deeply and personally. Murphy had found a paper trail, too.

They made their initial report to Cowley and he rubbed his hands, then took out a bottle of scotch. Best single malt by what Bodie could see of the label. The usually irascible Scot poured a small glass for each of them and handed the drinks around as if they were gold. Perhaps in his opinion they were.

“Here’s to a job well done, and a happy Christmas,” he said, raising his own glass and draining it in one swallow. Jax and Murphy copied him but Bodie was determined to savour the precious liquid. Cowley’s brows quirked. “I didn’t think you’d be slow to take a drop,” he said.

“I’m not, sir,” said Bodie. “A drop of scotch is one of the three things I’ll never say no to. But I’d rather sip it - out of respect, you understand.” He didn’t tell them what the other two things were and they didn’t ask. Cowley just smiled and watched benignly while Bodie drank slowly.

“Off ye go, then,” he said at last. “Call in on that partner of yours and see how’s he doing. Wish him Season’s Greetings from me if he’s awake.”

“Yes, sir.” Bodie allowed himself to smile as he put his now empty glass on the desk and turned to the door.

 

Doyle wasn’t awake. He was pumped full of painkillers and had stitches above his right ear, where they’d shaved his curls. He wouldn’t be best pleased, thought his partner, when he woke up. His charts, which Bodie read unashamedly, showed the doctors thought there was little chance of concussion but the patient would still have a whopping headache to contend with.

The nurses were in as festive a mood as Bodie could have hoped for and he spent a pleasant hour teasing and laughing with them. There was no mistletoe but searching for it made an amusing diversion. Then he went out into the cold of the streets.

It was full daylight now, but might as well not have been. The sky was overcast and heavy with rain or perhaps snow. There would be a few hours of gloom then darkness would fall again. Bodie thought he preferred that - at least there were Christmas lights to liven it up, regardless of the weather. He drove home, wishing he wasn’t alone, glad Ray wasn’t in danger but wanting his presence. Not that they’d planned to spend Christmas together unless Cowley sent them somewhere together, but there hadn’t been time to plan anything else and they might have ended up eating at one or the other flat and watching the Queen’s speech together in a haze of goodwill and perhaps alcoholic relaxation. Bodie felt resentfully lonely - and very, very tired.

He didn’t wake up till Boxing Day and when he’d breakfasted he headed straight for the hospital after checking that Cowley had no tasks for him.

“Take the day off,” he heard his boss say. The spirit of Christmas must have been heavily imbibed chez Cowley.

 

Doyle was sitting on the edge of his bed, dressed, with the sales jacket slung over his arm. He didn’t waste time in greetings.

“I can go home provided someone will keep an eye on me and as you’re my partner, for better or worse, that means you,” he said, in a tone that dared Bodie to disagree.

“Happy Christmas to you too,” said Bodie, “and Season’s Greetings from Cowley. And before you ask, we have the day off.”

Doyle’s lips curved into a grin and his face lifted instantly, losing its tension and gloom. The next few minutes were spent arguing with a nurse who insisted that it was hospital policy that all patients should leave in a wheel chair despite Doyle’s insistence that CI5’s policy was that they should leave on their own two feet unless they were heading for the morgue. Doyle won and the nurse had to be content with second prize - chocolates Bodie had bought on his way in.

 

The two men went out to the car park and Ray stretched luxuriously in the car.

“How’s Hawthorne?” he asked.

“Still out of it. Under police guard and drugged senseless. But he’ll sing. Not much option really.” Bodie told Ray about the guns and the paperwork Murphy had found in the warehouse that incriminated Hawthorne up to his armpits.

“You don’t think he’ll claim he didn’t know? That it was his innocence and anger that fuelled the fight?” Ray didn’t want his headache to be in vain.

“I don’t see how he can. He’s no fool, whatever else he is, and he can’t explain away the orders and invoices.” There was a satisfied silence in the Capri until they reached Bodie’s flat.

“You could have dropped me at mine,” said Doyle.

“Nah, I have to keep an eye on you, remember. And that means you’re staying with me.” Bodie glanced at Ray as they went up the stairs. “I’ll take the couch, in honour of your wounds.”

Doyle acquiesced quickly. There was no argument, no attempt to sound independent. Either his head was worse than it looked or... Bodie turned his thoughts off. He felt, sometimes, as if he’d installed a tap on them, one he could turn on and off at will.

He made lunch, something on toast, fast, warm and tasty. They watched television, the usual mindless Boxing Day fare, and as the day grew darker they could see the lights of the tree in the house opposite, twinkling happily. Bodie made a cup of tea and handed Ray his pills.

“Where’s my festive drink, then?” said the invalid.

“If you mean scotch, I thought with your pills...”

“No. Didn’t you know? That’s all a load of rubbish. Some pills don’t work as well with alcohol but most don’t mind. The old instructions were so that you didn’t drink too much and forget your next dose or that you’d already had one.”

“Who told you that?”

“Last bird but one. Pharmacist.” Succinct and unanswerable. Bodie retrieved the scotch from where he’d hidden it in a kitchen cupboard and poured a generous measure each. He told Ray about Cowley’s drinks round and his own response.

“A real waste, that is; downing good malt in one. Some things should always be savoured! And scotch, being one of the things I’d never say no to, is one of them!”

“You said, before we were so rudely interrupted, that chocolate biccies were another of those things. You said there were three. What’s the other?”

Bodie found himself blushing. He hadn’t intended the conversation to take that particular turn. He blustered but couldn’t think of anything to put forward as the third thing; well, not to take the place of the real third, anyway. He saw Ray was watching him with increasing amusement and sighed.

“I don’t know what the third is, all right?”

“Of course you don’t.”

“No, really, it’s just something I’ve always said.”

“OK.”

They fell into a silence that was nevertheless companionable, turning to the TV again, sitting together but decorously apart on the couch. Then Ray fell asleep, his head coming to rest on his partners’ shoulder. Bodie froze. He wanted to stay like that for ever and at the same time wanted to run a mile in case Ray woke and thought, well, thought Bodie had engineered it or that Bodie might think, when he didn’t want him to think, or that... By this time his thoughts were hopelessly tangled and the tap was proving harder to turn off. He found he’d put an arm round the man sleeping so trustingly beside him, only, of course, to offer support. Not to imply anything. Not to take advantage.

He realised Ray was in fact awake when his head butted closer and nestled in almost under his chin.

“Comfortable, this,” came a very quiet murmur. so soft you had to be listening hard to hear it. And he was listening. Oh yes, he was listening.

“Very.” His own reply was a mere breath.

“Could bear to stay like this. Good for headaches.” The voice from beneath the curls was stronger this time. Bodie’s arm clearly had thoughts of its own because it tightened its grip on the shoulder beside him.

“That’s the third thing I’d never say no to,” he heard himself say. “An armful of Ray Doyle.” And although it was already Boxing Day it turned out to be the happiest Christmas either of them had ever had. And the couch spent the night alone.


End file.
